Hoodie

I finished a pair of pants for Seth using my Oliver + S pattern again. I used french terry to make these and they turned out really cozy and Seth said he loved them.

I took these pictures of them in a rush before he left for school and thought, we'll take some better ones when he gets home.

I know you can't even see the details in the pants or anything in this picture, but at least they're documented.

He threw himself down on the ground because he said my picture taking was going to make him late for school and he hates being late. I just laughed and took more pictures.

Sadly, I didn't take any better ones when he got home because the pants met their demise after just one wearing and I was so mad about it that I didn't bother taking any more.

You see, I have never had to worry about changing my needles around on my serger. I've pretty much used size 90/14 needles with a regular point for ALL my fabrics, knit or woven. I've never had a problem, even on lightweight knits or heavy denim.

But for some reason, my serger hated this french terry. It couldn't handle it at all. After breaking three of my usual needles on the stuff, I decided to try some size 100/16 needles I have because I thought that surely those needles would show that french terry who's boss.

But the 100/16s were too much for the poor fabric and they put tiny holes in it. I only serged one seam with the needles-the back crotch seam-before I could see that they weren't going to work.

Since the holes were tiny, I topstitched the fabric down on the right side of the pants and thought it would be okay. But it wasn't ok at all. When he got home, the pants had already almost torn completely through all along that back seam.

I was so sad about it. I even felt a little sick to my stomach and I started thinking of all the things that are wrong with the clothes that I sew. But then I remembered something someone said in church recently. He said that he was thankful for imperfections in life, and I felt better thinking about it. All the imperfections in my clothes tell a story of learning and it's a lot better to think of it that way instead of just thinking that I suck.

And I will never, ever use regular point needles on knit fabrics in my serger again, and especially not heavy duty ones.

Anyway, I also made a hoodie for me this week. I have some fabric I ordered from girlcharlee.com several months ago that I have never used because it has sparkles in it and I didn't realize that when I bought it. I am not a huge fan of sparkles. But I wanted to use it and I was getting a good vibe about turning it into a hoodie.

I used a pattern from the craftsy class I took by Meg McElwee about 10 months ago. I made one when I took the class, but I didn't like it very well because it was way too tapered at the bottom for my liking. So this time I took the pattern in a lot. I also lined my hood this time, shortened the sleeves because I hate sleeves that are too long and get in my way, and I added cuffs to the sleeves and banded the hem.

I like how it turned out and I think it's a good pattern with my alterations. The only other thing is that the hood is really big. I'm not sure why it's so big, but I didn't want to try and change it because then I'd have to change the neck opening to make it fit and all of that.

I finished the hoodie just this afternoon, and then I wore it on our family bike ride to eat dinner at Costa Vida. We had the most beautiful weather today and we had to make good use of it because you don't see many days like today during a November in Idaho!

I love the hood lining.